Queen's Gambit: A Novel

Widowed for the second time at age 31, Katherine Parr falls deeply for the dashing courtier Thomas Seymour and hopes at last to marry for love. However, obliged to return to court, she attracts the attentions of the ailing, egotistical, and dangerously powerful Henry VIII, who dispatches his love rival, Seymour, to the Continent. No one is in a position to refuse a royal proposal, so haunted by the fates of his previous wives - two executions, two annulments, one death in childbirth - Katherine must wed Henry and become his sixth queen.

March

As the North reels under a series of unexpected defeats during the dark first year of the war, one man leaves behind his family to aid the Union cause. His experiences will utterly change his marriage and challenge his most ardently held beliefs. Riveting and elegant as it is meticulously researched, March is an extraordinary novel woven out of the lore of American history.

The Secret Chord: A Novel

With more than two million copies of her novels sold, New York Times best-selling author Geraldine Brooks has achieved both popular and critical acclaim. Now, Brooks takes on one of literature's richest and most enigmatic figures: a man who shimmers between history and legend. Peeling away the myth to bring David to life in Second Iron Age Israel, Brooks traces the arc of his journey from obscurity to fame, from shepherd to soldier, from hero to traitor, from beloved king to murderous despot and into his remorseful and diminished dotage.

People of the Book

This ambitious, electrifying work traces the harrowing journey of the famed Sarajevo Haggadah, a beautifully illuminated Hebrew manuscript created in 15th-century Spain.

When it falls to Hanna Heath, an Australian rare-book expert, to conserve this priceless work, the series of tiny artifacts she discovers in its ancient binding - an insect wing fragment, wine stains, salt crystals, a white hair - only begin to unlock its deep mysteries.

The Valley of Amazement

Shanghai, 1912. Violet Minturn is the privileged daughter of the American madam of the city's most exclusive courtesan house. But when the Ching dynasty is overturned, Violet is separated from her mother in a cruel act of chicanery and forced to become a "virgin courtesan." Half-Chinese and half-American, Violet grapples with her place in the worlds of East and West - until she is able to merge her two halves, empowering her to become a shrewd courtesan who excels in the business of seduction and illusion, though she still struggles to understand who she is.

Nine Parts of Desire: The Hidden World of Islamic Women

Nine Parts of Desire: The Hidden World of Islamic Women is the story of Brooks’ intrepid journey toward an understanding of the women behind the veils, and of the often contradictory political, religious, and cultural forces that shape their lives. In fundamentalist Iran, Brooks finagles an invitation to tea with the ayatollah’s widow—and discovers that Mrs. Khomeini dyes her hair.

Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China

Few books have had such an impact as Wild Swans: a popular best seller which has sold more than 13 million copies and a critically acclaimed history of China; a tragic tale of nightmarish cruelty and an uplifting story of bravery and survival.

TransAtlantic: A Novel

In the National Book Award-winning Let the Great World Spin, Colum McCann thrilled readers with a marvelous high-wire act of fiction that The New York Times Book Review called "an emotional tour de force". Now McCann demonstrates once again why he is one of the most acclaimed and essential authors of his generation with a soaring novel that spans continents, leaps centuries, and unites a cast of deftly rendered characters, both real and imagined.

Half of a Yellow Sun: A Novel

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Adichie’s brilliant historical novel follows the fortunes of five characters living through the tumultuous 1960s—a time when the Biafran-Nigerian War raged in southern Africa.

Caleb's Crossing

In 1665, a young man from Martha's Vineyard became the first Native American to graduate from Harvard College. Upon this slender factual scaffold, Brooks has created a luminous tale of love and faith, magic and adventure. The narrator of Caleb's Crossing is Bethia Mayfield, growing up in the tiny settlement of Great Harbor amid a small band of pioneers and Puritans. Restless and curious, she yearns after an education that is closed to her by her sex....

To Capture What We Cannot Keep: A Novel

In February 1887, Caitriona Wallace and Émile Nouguier meet in a hot air balloon, floating high above Paris--a moment of pure possibility. But back on firm ground, their vastly different social strata become clear. Cait is a widow who because of her precarious financial situation is forced to chaperone two wealthy Scottish charges. Émile is expected to take on the bourgeois stability of his family's business and choose a suitable wife.

The Mill River Recluse: A Novel

From the outside, Mill River looks like any sleepy little Vermont town where everyone knows everyone and people never need to lock their doors. There are newcomers for whom this appeals, from police officer Kyle Hansen and his daughter Rowen, who are starting over after heartache, to Claudia Simon, the schoolteacher who is determined to reinvent herself. But on closer inspection, there are those in Mill River - including a stealthy arsonist, a covetous nurse, and a pilfering priest - who have things they wish to hide.

A God in Ruins: A Novel

A God in Ruins tells the dramatic story of the 20th century through Ursula's beloved younger brother, Teddy - would-be poet, heroic pilot, husband, father, and grandfather - as he navigates the perils and progress of a rapidly changing world. After all that Teddy endures in battle, his greatest challenge is living in a future he never expected to have.

A Town Like Alice

Jean Paget is just twenty years old and working in Malaya when the Japanese invasion begins. When she is captured she joins a group of other European women and children whom the Japanese force to march for miles through the jungle. While on the march, the group run into some Australian prisoners, one of whom, Joe Harman, helps them steal some food, and is horrifically punished by the Japanese as a result.

The Alphabet House

British pilots James Teasdale and Bryan Young have been chosen to conduct a special photo-reconnaissance mission near Dresden, Germany. Intelligence believes the Nazis are building new factories that could turn the tide of the war. When their plane is shot down, James and Bryan know they will be executed if captured. With an enemy patrol in pursuit, they manage to jump aboard a train reserved for senior SS soldiers wounded on the eastern front.

The Obituary Writer

A sophisticated and suspenseful novel about the poignant lives of two women living in different eras.... On the day John F. Kennedy is inaugurated, Claire, a young wife and mother obsessed with the glamour of Jackie, struggles over the decision of whether to stay in a loveless but secure marriage or to follow the man she loves and whose baby she may be carrying. Decades earlier, in 1919, Vivien Lowe, an obituary writer, is searching for her lover, who disappeared in the Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906.

The Secret Keeper

England, 1959: Laurel Nicolson is 16 years old, dreaming alone in her childhood tree house during a family celebration at their home, Green Acres Farm. She spies a stranger coming up the long road to the farm and then observes her mother, Dorothy, speaking to him. And then she witnesses a crime.

Orhan's Inheritance

When Orhan's brilliant and eccentric grandfather - a man who built a dynasty out of making kilim rugs - is found dead, submerged in a vat of dye, Orhan inherits the decades-old business. But his grandfather's will raises more questions than answers.

Touchstone

His existence shattered by the Great War, Bennett Grey is investigated by an American agent who thinks he may be useful for protecting national security. U.S. Bureau of Investigation agent Harris Stuyvesant's first inclination is to let his fists do the talking. But he's well out of his jurisdiction, having traveled across the Atlantic to dig up clues on an Englishman he believes responsible for terrorist acts in the States.

Call the Midwife: A Memoir of Birth, Joy, and Hard Times

At the age of 22, Jennifer Worth left her comfortable home to move into a convent and become a midwife in postwar London’s East End slums. The colorful characters she met while delivering babies all over London - from the plucky, warm-hearted nuns with whom she lived to the woman with 24 children who couldn't speak English to the prostitutes and dockers of the city’s seedier side - illuminate a fascinating time in history.

The Midwife's Revolt

On a dark night in 1775, Lizzie Boylston is awakened by the sound of cannons. From a hill south of Boston, she watches as fires burn in Charlestown, in a battle that she soon discovers has claimed her husband's life.

Carmen Moore says:"Seemed true to the thoughts of the revolutionary war"

A Man Called Ove

Meet Ove. He's a curmudgeon - the kind of man who points at people he dislikes as if they were burglars caught outside his bedroom window. He has staunch principles, strict routines, and a short fuse. People call him "the bitter neighbor from hell". But behind the cranky exterior there is a story and a sadness.

Maisie Dobbs

Maisie Dobbs isn't just any young housemaid. Through her own natural intelligence - and the patronage of her benevolent employers - she works her way into college at Cambridge. After the War I and her service as a nurse, Maisie hangs out her shingle back at home: M. DOBBS, TRADE AND PERSONAL INVESTIGATIONS. But her very first assignment soon reveals a much deeper, darker web of secrets, which will force Maisie to revisit the horrors of the Great War and the love she left behind.

Illumination Night

Illumination Night follows the lives of a young blond giant who is as beautiful as he is frightening; an old woman at the end of her life whose last mission is to save her granddaughter's soul; a family torn apart by a wife's fears and a husband's unrealized desires; and the high school girl who comes to Martha's Vineyard against her will, who steals husbands and cars, and who will bring everyone together in a web of yearning, sin, and ultimate redemption.

Publisher's Summary

When an infected bolt of cloth carries plague from London to an isolated village, a housemaid named Anna Frith emerges as an unlikely heroine and healer. Through Anna's eyes we follow the story of the fateful year of 1666, as she and her fellow villagers confront the spread of disease and superstition. As death reaches into every household and villagers turn from prayers to murderous witch-hunting, Anna must find the strength to confront the disintegration of her community and the lure of illicit love. As she struggles to survive and grow, a year of catastrophe becomes instead annus mirabilis, a "year of wonders."

Inspired by the true story of Eyam, a village in the rugged hill country of England, Year of Wonders is a richly detailed evocation of a singular moment in history. Written with stunning emotional intelligence and introducing "an inspiring heroine" (The Wall Street Journal), Brooks blends love and learning, loss and renewal into a spellbinding and unforgettable read.

Brooks puts the reader right into the middle of a 17th century English village that has been struck by the plague. Based on real events, the story recounts the village's decision to seal itself off from the surrounding countryside in order to contain the sickness. The first person point of view is from an intelligent, thoughtful young widow who keeps sheep and works as a maid to the Rector and his wife. The bitter conflicts and heartbreaking effects of the rapidly spreading deadly illness within the town come alive in this riveting story. The author is the narrator and I can not imagine a better performance. This is an emotional story that kept me awake late into the night listening.

Would you try another book from Geraldine Brooks and/or Geraldine Brooks?

I believe I would have loved this story if the reader had not been a nasal laconic reader. Although I finished the entire book, it was difficult because of the reader. I know it was read by the author so that is her portrayal of what she imagined the characters to be, but it prohibited me from fully appreciating the story. She is a talented author, but should have left the reading to someone else.

Beautiful and heartbreaking....a wonderful historical novel that makes you happy you are living now. Beautifully read by the author. I couldn't stop listening so did all my grocery shopping and driving and house cleaning without stopping it.

Geraldine Brooks is an exceptional storyteller. Her characters are well developed and she so draws you into the time, you truly feel a part of it. However, her narration is a bit flat and atonal, definitely lacking in emotion. This should not deter one from reading the book. The story is too beautiful to be missed.

Would you consider the audio edition of Year of Wonders to be better than the print version?

Nope! I will be now be purchasing the print version to see if I can finish it in that format.

Would you recommend Year of Wonders to your friends? Why or why not?

Yes, it's an interesting account of the plague told through the eyes of a strong protagonist with a moving backstory.

How could the performance have been better?

The reader narrates everything in a board, emotionless monotone that makes it sound as if she's stoned or really uninterested in what she's reading. I fell asleep on two occasions and my mind would wander when I did manage to keep awake and try to listen.

Any additional comments?

I'm sure this is a good book and I'm sure I'll be able to get into it much more in print. Consider listening to a sample before purchasing the audiobook.

Year of Wonders is a gripping tale & was well written. But,....and this is a BIG but, as many have stated previously, a writer should never read their own work. Well, OK, if Will Patton ever decides to write a book, please, let him read it too. But in this case, with all due respect to Miss Brooks, someone else should have narrated this important, powerful story. Her voice is thin & watery for starters. She has no ability to change her voice to even hint that another was speaking. At times she sounded like a bored school kid doing an oral report, sometimes trailing off at the end of sentences. There were moments when I felt she might just as well have said 'Yada, yada, yada' or 'blah. blah, blah' for all the enthusiasm she showed. Truly, it was the worst narration I've chosen to sit through. If the story hadn't been as good I'd have given up an hour in. I thought about giving up many times. The fact that I didn't testifies to the strength of the book itself. I know not everyone can read like Davina Porter of 'Outlander' fame, but come on! This was weak & uninspired despite a story that should have fanned at least a little heat. I wish I could say more about what I liked about the story itself, but the reading of it totally overshadowed everything else for me.

Every character sounds alike... Reader is not opening her mouth. So if you feel like listening to 10 hours of a mumbling, sleepy, teenage monotone you are in luck! The story could be fantastic but I just can't get past the reader...

What could Geraldine Brooks have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

It is a very, very, very rare case that an author is the best reader for a work. The only exceptions to that rule is David Spade.

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Geraldine Brooks?

Anyone....

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

This book is very well written, and the characters are vivid and alive - sorry actually many of them are dead by the end of the book. It is about the plague, after all. The author intensely transports you back to this era and surprises the reader at every turn. The story is so well crafted that I felt like I was watching a movie in my mind. I couldn't wait to find out what would happen next, and found myself listening late into the night. Not for the squeamish, there is no lack of realistic detail about the hardships of the period and the nightmare of the plague. I love the author's style of writing, having gotten hooked with Caleb's Crossing. The author reads her own book again, but in a more ordinary spoken style, rather that the careful enunciation of Caleb's Crossing that irritated some readers (I liked it). I highly recommend this book of fiction that relies heavily on historical fact, based on a true story. It is fearful, horrifying, suspenseful, colorful, engaging, and irresistable.